University of California Santa Cruz has announced that the public can now access the Grateful Dead Archive Online (GDAO), a website that holds the massive collection of Grateful Dead documentation from 1965–1995. The archive holds a history of the band with over 45,000 digital artifacts like “photographs, fanzines, and fan-decorated envelopes.” Items in the collection are from the “UCSC Library’s extensive Grateful Dead Archive (GDA) and from digital content submitted by the community and global network of Grateful Dead fans.”

University Librarian Ginny Steel is enthusiastic about the launch of the new web site.

“This is a significant contribution to the Deadhead and Grateful Dead scholarly community,” she noted. “The functionality included in GDAO will offer new opportunities for people to engage with the band’s legacy and to help build it, so we are excited to be able to provide such wide access to this collection.”